Just before this year’s announcement of the Nobel Peace Prize, one thing is certain: Donald Trump will not receive the award he so desperately wants this year. But which name will the Norwegian Nobel Committee pull from the hat? It’s worth noting that the Nobel Prize will be announced on Friday at 12:00 Greek time in Oslo, against a rather dark backdrop: since 1946 when these statistics began being recorded, the number of armed conflicts has never been as high as in 2024, according to Uppsala University in Sweden. One thing seems certain. Although he claims to deserve the award for his role in resolving eight conflicts, Donald Trump will not receive it, at least not this time, if observers are to be believed.
Nobel Peace Prize 2025: “Trump won’t be the winner this year”
“No, it won’t be Trump this year,” Swedish professor Peter Wallensteen, an international affairs specialist, tells AFP. “Perhaps next year though? By then, the dust will have settled around his various initiatives, mainly regarding the Gaza crisis,” he adds. Experts consider the “peacemaker” record claimed by the American president highly exaggerated and express concerns about the impact of his “America First” agenda.
“Beyond his attempts to mediate for Gaza, we observe policies that contradict the intentions and principles mentioned in Nobel’s will,” namely international cooperation, brotherhood among peoples, and disarmament, notes Nina Graeger, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO).
This year 338 individuals and organizations have been nominated for the Nobel Prize, while the list remains secret for 50 years. Tens of thousands of people (parliamentarians and ministers from all countries, former laureates, certain university professors, Nobel committee members…) can submit a nomination.
In 2024, the Nobel Prize was awarded to Nihon Hidankyo, an organization of survivors from the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings that campaigns against nuclear weapons.
In the absence of a clear favorite, various names are circulating in Oslo: the Sudanese volunteer network Emergency Response Rooms (ERR), Russian Yulia Navalnaya, widow of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, or the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s election monitoring service (ODIHR).
“This year a less controversial figure will be chosen”
In recent years, the Nobel Committee’s choices show “a return to things closer to classical ideas of peace, while maintaining connections to human rights, democracy, press freedom, and women,” says Halvard Leira, research director at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI). “My intuition is that this year a less controversial figure will be chosen for the award,” he adds.
The Nobel Peace Prize Committee could thus choose to emphasize its commitment to a global order challenged by Donald Trump, by awarding UN Secretary-General António Guterres and/or a United Nations agency, such as the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) or the agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).
International justice could also be recognized -the UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ) or the International Criminal Court- or press freedom under threat, by awarding non-governmental organizations like the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF). Finally, the committee could choose to surprise, as often happens.
